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Talk:APPENDIX XV: How many Troops in a Legion?/@comment-1416077-20160609175022
Quote: :"Regarding spending numbers in general - given what a tiny portion of the Commonwealth population its legions represent, Im forced to consider that either 1.) They ARENT on a war footing, " The worlds far from the front might still be feeling the effects of the war; look at the mainland US during WWII; rationing, the men being drafted... although given the parliamentary nature of the CW, there might be worlds saying that there is no danger, that it's all propaganda and the problem of those worlds near the border, while others are calling for the draft and total mobilization. It may be 4,000 years in the future, but politicians never change... ;) Quote: :"2.) there are HUGE military forces (garrison forces?) in existence soaking up a lot more population and money than the legions are," Yes. There are. Canonically, neither the RL or the CW field "garrison legions", but I read that as "they do not field formations called 'garrison legions' that conform to the specific traits set herein as defining a TOG Garrison Legion." They may be called "militia brigades/divisions", may not be as tactically flexible as a "modern" legion, but have enough capability to face a legion on close-to-equal terms (depending on training and actual equipment). Quote: :"or 3.) The listed 500K Legions and 10,000 BB Groups represent a spending limit, and high end military forces are, in the RL universe, constrainted by resources/cost rather than by manpower." I don't think cost comes into this equation; the CW might field 500,000 infantry and strike legions (give or take a couple dozen thousand), but they likely field enough regiments and auxilia to fill out several times that number in other formations that do not conform to the rules-defined "legion". Same for naval squadrons/groups: these formations are very well defined; the actual navy might include several times that number of ships not organized as part of a squadron or group: singletons, couriers, pairs, squads, destroyer flotillas... Quote: :"The last seems most likley to me, though the costs for civilian ground cars concern me.... " The official term is "FASAnomics". FASA was notoriously bad at this kind of thing. FASAnomics in Battletech is hopeless; the people who did those did RL. Best we can do is simply assume that the military forces we are seeing in canon are but a tiny fraction of the forces available. My calculations bear that each TOG world can support an Army (military formation) of over 1,200 legions based primarily on young citizen-class compulsory military service (I discuss this in Appendix XIa: TOG Legion Designation of Origin and in APPENDIX XIV: How does TOG maintain control over quadrillions of citizens?). There is no reason to doubt that each Commonwealth world that has instituted an Emergency Powers draft or emergency recruitment drive, cannot field similar numbers of troops. Even more interesting, It would not even dent the local economy to maintain these numbers. Quote: :"1.) Perhaps the TOG spends a lot more on small combatants/defense ships proportionally than the US. We dont invest a lot in the coast guard, whereas one assumes that the TOG 'garrisons' every world with at the least fighters and police cutters." Yes. TOG maintains large numbers of ships of all sizes that essentially never leave their operational area; some spending upwards of 10 months a year docked at some facility or other. Many ships are designed for relatively short trips, significantly shorter that 10,000 LY, while some never even leavy their system, even when equipped with FTL. Quote: :"2.) Perhaps the standard of living in the TOG is not all their equivalent of 'first world'. This seems logical. We are only a few centuries from the revolt against the Kess'Rith, most terraformed worlds are probably relatively less habitable/more expensive to live on than earth (we EVOLVED here, after all), and its no more plausible that all of the TOG is at the highest standard of living and productivity of THERE universe than to assume our world is for its. When we consider the historically low efficiency of slave labor, there is even more support for this." This assumes that "slave labor" is like that seen in the movies. Remember that ALL terran humans were slaves under the Ssora, but they had their own army; most people simply lived on with their lives. IMHO, the vast majority of slaves in TOG (with the notable exception of those sentenced to hard labor) would be akin to what we today call "wage slaves"; they do have rights (fewer than other castes, but they do have them), they can own property, they live in their own (assigned) homes, have their own hobbies, entertainment, and passtimes, probably their own sports teams. They just can't quit their jobs without sonsequence, travel without their boss's permission, possibly have children without a permit... While promotions, perks and privileges exist to encourage quality work; promotions, better quarters, better food, better car, etc. They might be able to save enough to buy their way out of slavery... then sell themselves back in it if the debt gets too bad. Quote: :"3.) Perhaps the ground forces consume a relativley larger share of the military pie in the TOG than they do in the US. GIven the need to garrison potentially restive worlds, this seems likely. Further, it would help explain the greater Commonwealth naval percentages, both relative to population and relative to ground forces." Or it could simply be jotted down to different approaches to war: You don't need as many ground troops if the enemy can't land theirs. Quote: :"4.) Perhaps the TOG simply isnt trying very hard. (this seems unlikely. Even if its not 'war to the knife' against the Commonwealth, they are only a few centuries away from an existential conflict against a large, powerful, and still very much ongoing Kess'Rith Empire)" I think that it is a matter of practicality and tactical inertia: TOG wants to bring all of humanity under one banner; to do this, they simply can't repeat Buntari's fiasco, because it would horrify the senate, and despite the press to the contrary, Caesar simply cannot rule without the senates (all of them). This means that the worlds have to be taken the old-fashioned way: boots on the ground. Now, at the start of the Commonwealth Offensive, many worlds, counties and even dukedoms simply folded, some probably welcoming TOG as 'liberators'. The first stages of the war went very swiftly (I assume that the CW simply retreated its forces off-world to preserve them in order to retake the world later), but the last push into Shannedam (and one would assume the other counties along the front: Rift, Yoventov, Pembroke, and Birchshire) has resulted in a slower overall progress, as the line is drawn to halt the offensive. Large numbers of fresh units can't simply be brought in from other places within TOG, due to strategic and political reasons, so what does get sent are units with no history of working together, which have to wait months for replacement troops and which are often used incorrectly by field commanders. Add to this the canon rumor that the leader of the RLs is an Illustrus senator, and the plot thickens. Quote: :"Taken together, especially points 1 and 2, I dont think its unreasonable to assume that the major limiting factor on military power in the RL universe is not manpower, but unit cost." I agree, but I don't think it's the #1 limiting factor: IMHO, politics are even more influential in limiting available manpower in TOG; no senator is willing to lose his position to a coup (or worse; a vote of no confidence by his peers) while 'his' troops are months or even years away. Senators can direct military funding to a certain degree, and they can certainly make ships better suited to a revenue cutter role than a ship of the line... Quote: :"Wow, one TLDR later - I find the suggestion that the Commonwealth is in part on a 'war footing' entirely believable, especially the parts closer to the border (as of course, the economies at large could not survive and prosper on a permanent war footing - exhaustion will eventually bring down a nation as surely as invasion) Its also likely that even the TOG is, spending wise, on a cold war level, and that the military arms of RL universe nations (at least the shiney, offensive arms like Battleship Groups and Strike Legions) are constrained not by manpower, but by cost (cost expressed as skilled labor time and rare materials for command economies. Even if you dont pay in dollars, every bullet is less butter)." Yup. And every dead citizen's son is one more political problem to a senator. ;) Quote: :"That got a bit scattered. I'm sorry." Don't worry; I'm a bit afraid of actually posting this big ol' wall o' text... Quote: :"((Note - by our earlier assumptions, and assuming a legion IS 50K folks (between tooth and tail, I can totally see this), then one person per 2000 in Commonwealth is in a Legion. By comparison, about 1 person in 1600 in the US is an active duty Marine, one in 600 an active duty member of the army, and one in 200 a member of the National Guard.In 1945, one American in 17 was in the army, and one in 11.5 was in the military. Roughly 35x more than currently in the army, and our current is far higher than the Commonwealth. Either the RL Universe powers are on 'quiet peace' setting, or the limitations are absolutely based on resources rather than population))" APPENDIX XV: How many Troops in a Legion? breaks down the numbers. APPENDIX XIV: How does TOG maintain control over quadrillions of citizens? shows how every one million inhabitants of a world can sustain one legion plus auxiliae. Quote: :"((Also-Also note: WMDs, planet burning, etc. just seems to be 'not a done thing' in the RL universe.. theres really only one exception in cannon that springs to mind, and it horrified EVERYONE, including the Kess'Rith who were its victims - and the Kess'Rith really are the bloody-handed warmongers of the setting. " Plus the desire to take the worlds intact. Humans breed A LOT, and every slagged world is one less world for "TOG, Humanity's Saviortm" to use for plainting babies and breeding grains. Quote: :"If it were not possible to conquer a planet with ground forces, then this would not be the case. This suggests that planetary conquest is possible by a relatively tiny percentage of the defending population... even TEN strike legions is tiny across a whole world. Yet they can conquer it. This suggest again that the limitation on military power is financial, rather than population (else insurgencies with second-rate equipment would make planets unconquerable)." IMHO, when invading a world, Strike Legions do not operate alone; there are enough auxiliae and even attached "lesser" legions to multiply its strength significantly. Quote: :"Of course, Military forces in the RL universe are incredibly, mind-boggling mobile, so a strike legion (much less orbit capable fighters and space based Orbital Artillery Support) can control an amount of area out of all proportion to their size, and probably moving in low-intensity, very very cheap (relatively) garrison forces (capable of suppressing populations, but not defeating high intensity forces) after the inital conquest defeats any high value defenders))" The problem with garrison forces is their immobility, even on the same world; A strike-legion led brigade lands, sets up a beachhead, then effectively besieges important targets, rolling (er... hovering) in while capturing the surrounding areas. Local militia can only respond locally, but surrounding regions on the planet can reinforce the ones repelling the invaders... until fully grav-capable reinforcements arrive and begin a countersiege... This is how a planetary invasion can be bogged down for decades.